Arrivals still up, but correction expected Figures released by the Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB) at the end of November 2008 showed that visitor arrivals in the first ten months of 2008 had increased by 6% year on year (y-o-y), to 24,301,551.

Arrivals for November itself were down 1.4%, at 2,532,740, reflecting the severe deterioration in the global economic environment that has occurred since our last tourism sector report.

China remains the main source market for in-bound tourists, with some 13,878,008 people visiting Hong Kong over the first nine months of 2008, up 9.5% y-o-y.

2008 has been a strong year for Hong Kong tourism and we remain optimistic on the longer-term prognosis for the territory. However, for the short term, we now expect the global economic slowdown to have a significant impact on discretionary spending, which will clearly impact on tourism industries around the globe. As such, we do not now believe that Hong Kong’s total tourism arrival figures will be able to surpass 2007’s 28.17mn by any meaningful amount, forecasting 28.20mn as a ballpark figure at this stage.

We have also made downward revisions to our forecasts for 2009 and 2010. Beyond this point, we are cautiously optimistic that the global economy will regain traction and that tourism sector growth should then prove possible.

Airport Authority downbeat on near-term prospects At the end of November 2008, the finance director of Airport Authority Hong Kong (AAHK), Raymond Lai, stated that he expects waning travel demand to impact on earnings both this year and next.

The airport has seen three months of falling passenger numbers, with rising job insecurity causing both business and leisure travellers to cancel trips.

The CEO of AAHK, Stanley Hui, believes that traffic volumes at the airport will decline further over the near term. Despite the near-term difficulties, AAHK is pushing ahead with a feasibility study on the need for a third runway at Hong Kong Airport once travel demand picks up again.